Thank you all so, so, so much for your positive thoughts and prayers for Django. It is with incredible heartache and immeasurable sadness and grief that I share the sad news that Django died yesterday.

One of my favorite pictures of the three of us from our beach vacation last September.

In my last update, I told you that he was diagnosed with immune-mediated polyarthritis (IMPA), a painful and serious condition that causes joint inflammation and pain, after having an undiagnosed high fever for a week. He started the treatment of immunosuppressants, and after a day improved slightly. Instead of eating nothing, he started to eat a few spoons of peanut butter. After being the same for a few days with no further improvement, I asked his vet if I should be worried. She said no, that it could just take time for the meds to work, and to be worried if he got worse or his behavior changed.

On Friday, he ate canned dog food–his first real food in nearly two weeks. We were encouraged. Saturday I went out and bought him all sorts of canned dog food and his favorite foods, sure that recovery was just around the corner.

But that changed by Saturday night. He was no longer eating and seemed to be a little worse. On Sunday, he was much worse. He refused to even look at peanut butter and was moving significantly more slowly. He seemed to have a lot of trouble laying down on the bed. And his breathing was labored. Dave and I were both up with him Sunday night, and he was in very, very bad shape. He couldn’t seem to lay down on his bed at all, and put his head on his bolster as if to try to sleep standing up. He stood at his water bowl for a long time, just staring, and struggled drinking water. And when I went to take him outside, he was unsteady on his feet because he was so weak from not eating.

I decided to take him to the ER at 6 a.m. on Monday, thinking that they’d adjust his meds, and I’d have him home in time to start the work day. Instead, I got the worst news. He had fluid around his lungs, which could be caused by cancer, a side effect of the immunosuppressants, or something else. Finding the cause of this new complication would require many days in the hospital and many more tests. And the vet was not at all optimistic that even if they found the cause–and in some cases of IMPA, there is no cause–it would be a very long and difficult road ahead for him because he had not responded to treatment like 80% of dogs do. She gently suggested considering euthanasia.

I called Dave, and he drove up to the ER so we could discuss it. At this point, Django had lost 20 pounds and weighed just 54 pounds. His pain was so obvious in how he struggled to lie down and move. His eyes were so sad and had tear marks under them as if he’d been crying. We knew that we could not put him through yet another hospital stay and more tests, especially when the chances of him getting better seemed slim.

We spent hours with him in an exam room, kissing him, hugging him, and telling him what a good boy he was. And we held him while he passed away.

Even knowing what was going to happen…having him pass away in our arms was the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through in my life, second only to my father dying when I was a teenager.

I didn’t expect to lose Django that morning. Throughout this ordeal of him being sick, I never even considered he wouldn’t get better. I just thought it might take a long time. I always assumed Django would be with us for years. He would have turned 8 in June; we adopted him right before his second birthday.

Last Tuesday was the 19th anniversary of when Dave and I started dating. In all that time, this is the hardest thing we’ve gone through together. We have had two cats who had cancer, and that was very difficult. But the difference is that we knew the outcome and were somewhat prepared for it. With Django, we always assumed he would make it through.

To say we are devastated is an understatement. To say our lives revolved around Django isn’t. Our days were planned around him–fitting in his walk before I went to work, making sure I left work in time to take him out, planning our weekends around fun places to take him for a walk, taking him with us to local pet-friendly breweries, taking him to friends’ houses for get-together (because he’d been invited), taking him on weekend trips and vacations.

It’s simply unbearable to imagine life without him. His gorgeous eyes, his expressive ears, his silly personality–I’ll never get to experience them again. What’s left are constant reminders of our loss–his empty bed, his empty bowls, all the food I just bought for him, his collars, coats, and leashes.

My heart constantly aches, and I can’t stop crying. I miss him so much.

We took yesterday off and grieved. My cat Orla definitely knew we were sad and would lay on my lap every time I started crying. Orla was his buddy. The other cats swirled around us all day. It’s different for all of us.

I didn’t know how I’d go to work today. I had to interview someone first thing in the morning and then had a meeting with my boss’s boss. I put on makeup, thinking I wouldn’t cry. And then I cried the entire walk in. Work was a welcome distraction, and I didn’t cry as much as I would have if I’d worked from home. At the end of the day, I realized I had no reason to leave at a certain time. Django wouldn’t be waiting to go on his walk. I cried the whole walk home. And then I saw a package in the mail from the hospital where we took him yesterday, and I knew what it was–his collar. I walked into the house and just bawled when I saw his empty bed.

I’m so sad that he’s gone and so sad that he was so sick for two weeks and I couldn’t make him better. I can’t stop thinking of his sad eyes yesterday morning. I am trying to think of the positives: he’s not suffering anymore, we were with him almost nonstop the two weeks he was sick (I worked from home most of that time and slept in the living room with him because he couldn’t walk up the stairs to the bedroom), the weather was nice those two weeks so he didn’t have to deal with snow and extreme cold while not feeling good, and that we could be there and comfort him at the very end. I know he knew how much we loved him.

I’m so sorry this is so sad. I had planned on giving you all a positive update on how well he was doing. I would give anything for that to have happened.

Django was my everything. He was such a good boy, and I’m honored to have had him in my life. I can’t imagine life without him, but I’m trying to taking it one day at a time. I’m not sure about the future of this blog. I’m too sad right now to care about anything else. While I’m not saying goodbye, I am saying farewell until I have a better handle on my grief. And thank you so much for all your support and positive thoughts throughout this. It means so much to me!!!

I have sad news to share. My greyhound Django has been very ill for more than a week with a mystery illness.

He spent two days at an animal hospital last week due to an extremely high fever. After running every test imaginable, they weren’t able to come up with a diagnosis. They wanted to keep him at the hospital and see if the meds they were giving him helped. But he was not doing well there–I witnessed this when I visited him. He’s used to being in a calm and quiet environment, which is not an animal hospital. Plus, this hospital essentially gouged me on costs. To have him there for two days and have tests run cost nearly as much as what other friends paid to have their pets at another animal hospital for longer after going through major surgery. I basically had to fight this hospital to come get him–they made it seem like he would die if I took him home. It was a really bad experience, on top of being worried sick. I’m very upset at this hospital for a number of different things that happened.

I brought him home, and after a day of seeming to get better, his fever skyrocketed. I took him to the other animal hospital in the area. They pretty quickly came to a potential diagnosis. The first animal hospital suspected a bacterial infection–a tick-borne disease (though he is vaccinated for Lyme) or leptospirosis, which is from bacteria in pond or puddle water. But all the antibiotics they gave him did nothing to bring down his fever. The second animal hospital suspected Immune-Mediated Polyarthritis (IMPA), which causes join inflammation and pain (and fever). They kept him overnight, gave him a low dose of the steroids that are used to treat IMPA, and by the next day his fever was gone and I was able to take him home. I had a much better experience at this hospital.

The test results aren’t back yet, but we are proceeding with giving him the meds to treat IMPA. While his fever is gone, he has extreme pain, and it hurts him to move around. Plus, he lost his appetite a week ago when he had the fever and has not eaten much in a week. He has lost more than 10 pounds and is skin and bones. It’s so hard for me to see him like this.

If he has IMPA, he should start feeling better on the meds this week, though it can take up to two weeks. The full treatment can take up to six months, and recovery is very slow. It’s a lifelong condition that will need to be managed. If he doesn’t start feeling better, then we are going to have to run even more diagnostics. Or, he may have IMPA and not respond to treatment, which happens in some cases.

Today he seems to be feeling a tiny bit better. He’s drinking and peeing a lot and taking his meds, which are the most important things. And he ate a few spoons of peanut butter plus even a few small bites of ground meat–his first solid food in a week. But he is still very sick and in pain. He’s getting pain meds on top of his other meds, but the only other thing I can do is keep him comfortable on cushiony beds until he starts feeling better.

Poor Django. This whole situation breaks my heart. I’m trying to keep my thoughts positive and always talk really positive to him. But I hate seeing him like this. This is one of the hardest, saddest things I’ve ever had to deal with.

So I have not been blogging, running much, or really doing anything besides scouring Google for everything I can read about what he’s going through. Please send positive thoughts our way!

I’ve been waiting to share my plans for this year until I have some things firmed up, but it’s taking too long and I couldn’t wait to share!

After quitting marathon training last fall, I’ve given marathon training a lot of thought. I decided I wanted to run a marathon in 2018. However! I had a lot of trouble finding one I wanted to run. My requirements are:

Smallish size: I’d like it to be larger than the 88 participants in my first marathon but not huge.

Time limit of at least 6.5 hours: Having run a 6:03 marathon on a course with a time limit of 6 hours, I don’t want to have a time limit as another thing to stress me out.

Pace groups: I’d like to, ideally, run with others.

Scenic course or somewhere I’d enjoy running

Early fall timeframe

I thought a lot about the timing. Last fall, my motivation plummeted when it got cold. Summer training can suck, but I’ve liked summer training so much better than winter training the last two years. I feel like the worst that can happen in the summer is that I sweat a lot and slow down. No biggie. In winter, snow, ice, frigid temps, and lack of motivation can all derail my training. I’m so much more motivated and excited to run in summer. Ideally, I’ll train through summer for a race date no later than mid-October.

The challenge, of course, is that fall weather is such a wild card. It seems like on any given October day, it’s as likely to be 80 degrees as it is 50 degrees.

The race I initially chose that meets all my requirements is Wineglass in Corning, NY. Last year it was pretty cool on race day, but given that it’s an early fall race the last weekend of September, who knows? Still, I thought I might try for it, and if the weather sucks then oh well.

But then, when I started planning for our vacation, I realized something: Not all of the country has such inconsistent weather. The part of Northern California where we’re going this year for vacation has year-round consistent temperature in the 50s to mid-60s. I found a small marathon (about 150 people last year) with pace groups and a 6.5-hour time limit where we’ll be going on vacation–the Humboldt Bay Marathon. It’s the second weekend in August, when temperatures consistently are 50 degrees in the morning, getting up to the low-60s in the afternoon. In fact, the historical record high for this area is 85 degrees! With the race starting at 7 a.m., I’d be almost guaranteed to have cool weather for most of the race.

Plus, I’m very interested in exploring this area–hence going on vacation here–so would love to explore it on foot in a marathon. The other benefit is that I’d start training in April, after winter weather is gone, run through the summer, and be done with my goal race in mid-August. Plus, a really small race that has pace groups??? It sounds perfect!

The only thing is that we usually go on vacation in September, which isn’t a big deal. We just need to be sure that the rest of our vacation works around the race date. This is what I’m still working out. If it does, I will be running the Humboldt Bay Marathon this year!

My running plans, therefore, are based on running this race.

January through March I’ll be base building. I love that if the winter weather derails my running, it won’t matter. Have I mentioned how much I love not training in winter??? Especially this winter, which with its nonstop frigid temps and snow is the worst I can remember. In fact, if the winter continues its trend of frigid cold and snow and I can’t build up much base, I might run the half marathon instead of the full. I really wouldn’t want to start marathon training from ground zero.

April I’ll start training.

April through July I’ll look for races to do as training runs. I’ve shied away from summer races, but there’s at least one–Deckers Creek Half Marathon in West Virginia–in June that I’ve wanted to do, and training will give me a good excuse to do some summer races.

August 12 is the Humboldt Bay Marathon. I’ll run the race at the start of vacation so that I’ll be in recovery mode and not have to worry about training the rest of my vacation.

September through December will just be running for fun. I’d like to run the local Buffalo Creek Half Marathon in October–my favorite race–and any other races that sound good. I love the idea of having only a single goal race for the year since I’m more focused on running for fun instead of racing.

If the marathon doesn’t work out for August….ugh, I don’t know! I’ve actually considered registering for the Wineglass Marathon as a backup (I think it typically sells out in February) and then if the Humboldt Bay Marathon works out, running both marathons to make the most of my training. They’re six weeks apart, which is pretty ideal in terms of taking time off from marathon 1 and then keeping up my fitness for marathon 2. I know a lot of runners who have done that, and it makes a lot of sense to me. Plus, I do not plan to race for time.

The downside to that plan is that, again, weather for Wineglass is such a wild card, even if I’m just running it for fun. Also, I have no idea how motivated I’ll be to run a second marathon six weeks after the first. Although, I could defer Wineglass if I’m not up for it.

A safer back-up plan if Humboldt Bay doesn’t work out is to just run a local half marathon. While I’d like to run a marathon this year, I don’t want to run one just to run one. I want to actually be excited about and want to do the race, which is key to me getting to the starting line (as we know based on what happened last year!).

I feel like the stars are aligning around Humboldt Bay, and I’m genuinely excited it! And for me to be excited about a race is saying something! I also like the idea of Wineglass, but the weather scares me. I’m going to push forward with my travel plans and hope to firm things up so that I can register for Humboldt Bay by the end of this month.

As for my training, regardless of what race I do, it’s probably not a surprise that I will not be using the Hansons’ method and instead will be using the 80/20 method. I’m super excited to continue 80/20 training this year since I felt like it worked so well for me last year. For my base training, I’m planning to run at a low heart rate easy pace for as many runs as I can before I add in high-intensity running during training.

I’m so excited about this year’s running plans! I feel like my year will provide me a good mix of both running for fun and challenging myself.

Here’s to a fun year of running! What are your running plans? If you’ve posted them and I haven’t commented, please let me know so I can check them out. I love reading about plans for the year!

Welcome

Running is no fun if you don't look cute doing it! In this blog I share my passion for running and activewear. I'm chronicling my ever-evolving journey as a runner. I also post activewear reviews, healthy plant-based recipes, and pictures of my greyhound and kitties. Read more about me. Thanks for visiting!